Chris, I missed the beginning of the thread, but here's my ordeal (BIG
pita!!)
I had gone through 2 sets of spider gears in my open diff '95 8.25" rear.
The 2nd set was installed by a local Ferd dealer (long story, in a pinch to
get the work done). When the 2nd set crapped out 5months later, they had
worn temselves into the crosspin. Long story short, I had a buddy of mine
test the metal in the spider and side gears. He holds a masters in
metallurgy and a bunch of high-tech stuff that's way over my head...
>From talking to a DC axle tech, and several engineers, a few race guru's, I
came to find out the stock Rockwell hardness should be around 60 (give or
take, I forget the exact #). The 2nd set I had tested out between 28 and 34
Rw...
>From talking to the DC tech, apparently the open diffs are designed to
experience side gear/spider gear failure as the weak link, to save axle
shafts and ring/pinon sets. The former are much easier and quicker to r/r
than the latter...
How many miles on your truck? Warrenty??
I would recommend some traction aid such as spring clamps to get rid of any
axle-wrap (wheelhop) that you may have, as this will cause almost instant
gear damage. A better, yet more expensive fix would be to get rid of the
open diff (if so equipped) asap and replace it with a LSD (I got the whole
axle assembly from a boneyard)..
______________________
Jon Smith--Raleigh, NC
www.fast4x4.net
jon@fast4x4.net
ŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻ
-> When I changed my rear diff fluid the other day I found what looked like
->
-> a piece of a gear tooth, about an inch long. Other than that it was
-> clean, no grit in there or the old lube, the lube was actually pretty
-> clean, a medium amber color. This morning I took the truck in to flash
-> the new PCM and do the rear axle vent tube re-route. I showed the piece
-> to the service manager and he in turn called over a tech that thought it
->
-> was a piece of tooth that split off rather than wore or broke, he
-> thought this was do to insufficient hardening of the metal when it was
-> made. He said the gear should be replaced and since it's still under
-> warrantee it shouldn't be a problem, so I scheduled the work for Friday
-> and re-scheduled the other stuff for then too. I'm just worried that
-> when they get it up on the lift and see the Rancho kit they're gonna say
->
-> no warrantee deal, neither of them actually looked at the truck at the
-> time. It's pretty obvious it's not an excessive wear issue, all the
-> other teeth were fine, and the fluid was so clean. There's never been
-> any irregular noise or vibration back there, always has been and still
-> is very smooth, even smoother now with synthetic fluid and the new PCM.
-> So hopefully they'll be cool about it, I'm not going to mention anything
->
-> and just maybe they won't either.
->
-> Chris
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